This invention relates to an information storage and transmission system, and more specifically to a method and system for storing financial transactions in a portable unit for later transmission to a terminal unit, such as a personal computer, an automatic teller machine (ATM), or a terminal used for other transactions, such as a terminal at a department store used for point-of-sale transactions.
Over the past few years, more and more people and businesses have begun using personal computers to run software accounting applications that record and organize their financial transactions. These accounting systems, such as Quicken and Excel, can organize a person""s finances by, for example, establishing different accounts based on debits and credits, personal and business expenses, or tax and non-tax expenditures. Various accounts may be established which include credit card accounts, checking accounts, asset accounts (e.g., stocks and real estate), and liability accounts (e.g., mortgage and other payable loans). After these accounts have been established and data inputted into them, the user of these accounting packages can generate charts and graphs that track the user""s expenditures and help the user plan payment schedules and investment strategies.
In order to effectively use these software accounting applications, consumers need to keep accurate records of their daily financial transactions. In today""s era of multiple different financial transactions, such as telebanking, ATM transactions, credit card transactions, and checking transactions, it has become increasingly difficult for a user to keep an accurate paper record of all of his financial transactions. In addition, even if a user was able to keep a paper copy of all of the deposit slips, ATM receipts, sales receipts, and check registers, he must still type all of this information into the software accounting program to make use of the tools provided by the software accounting program.
For example, when a user writes a check, he must write down the information about the check, such as the check number, the date, the payee, and the amount in a checkbook. Then, when running the software accounting program, the user must input all of this data about the check into the personal computer running the software accounting program. Only after this information is entered into the program to reflect all of the activity in his account can the software package give meaningful information to the user, such as an accurate account balance, a chart showing actual expenditures for a given month a given item, or a table showing, for example, taxable and non-taxable income to date.
Most users are equally interested in tracking other financial transactions in addition to check writing. For example, when a user deducts money from his account using an ATM machine, he would also like to record that transaction. As described above, the user may again desire to input this data into the software accounting program on his personal computer so the accounting program can produce graphical and tabular data about his finances. Once again the user must manually input the data relating to the ATM transaction, such as the account number and the amount of the withdrawal, into the software accounting package. In addition, when a user travels to a department store, he may wish to make a note of any credit-card transactions and record these transactions so that he can manually enter the transactions into his software accounting program. A user must also record financial information at a point-of-sale, e.g., a store or other place of business. For the same reasons discussed above, the user may wish to electronically record this information so that he can later transfer it to a host PC or other terminal unit. In addition, a user may wish to purchase items from a vendor who demands immediate payment. The vendor may also, for example, not wish to pay merchant fees associated with a credit card or other transaction method that does not immediately transfer funds to his account.
The repetitive nature of this method of manual financial transaction record keeping is easily seen by the following example. First, the user must find his checkbook register in which he wrote the information about the check. The user then must type in a password to the accounting software to identify himself as an authorized user and thus grants him access to the financial data. Once the accounting software has verified the user""s identity, the user must go to the appropriate data fields in the software application and manually enter the financial transaction information, such as the date of the check, the check number, a transaction code (e.g., debit), the amount of the check, and the name of the person the check was made out to (e.g., payee). Although the user wrote down all of this information in the checkbook when he wrote the check, he must manually enter it into the computer using the computer keyboard. He must then repeat the manual entry of data for each check that he wrote since he last entered a transaction into the program. The repetitive task of entering these transactions into a personal computer (PC) is even more complicated when several different checking accounts are used.
Some conventional products allow a user to electronically record only some information about their financial transactions. For example, some of these products may keep a running account balance. These products do not store important information about each transaction, such as the check number, payee, or category (i.e., a transaction code), that allow the user to summarize and keep a separate running balance for each category. These conventional systems also do not allow the financial information they store to be easily electronically transferred to an accounting software application.
Other conventional hardware products which include an accounting system include personal digital assistants (PDAs) and organizers. The PDAs are handheld computer-based systems which are programmed to run a variety of applications programs, such as Pocket Quicken. To access the accounting system on these devices, the user must press a series of keys on a keypad or use an expensive touch screen to scroll through a list of options. After selecting the accounting program, the user may manual input his account and financial transaction information using a miniature keypad. As discussed below, these devices do not allow the financial information stored on them to be easily transferred to a PC or other system for later processing.
Other hardware products use read only memory (ROM) devices to store their applications so that the programs which are stored on these products cannot be easily changed or updated. Like the PDAs described above, these products also run software accounting applications like Pocket Quicken. These products, like PDAs also require that the user manually input all of the financial data using a keypad. In addition, these products also do not allow information stored on them to be easily transferred to a PC or other system for later processing. Therefore, it is desirable to provide a system and method for electronically entering handwritten and digital data about a plurality of financial transactions into a handheld computer which may be integrated with other financial data recorders, such as a checkbook, to limit the number of items a user must carry when making financial transactions.
Once a user has stored information about financial transactions in a handheld unit, he may want to transfer this information to a terminal unit, which may be a PC, an ATM, or any other terminal unit. If the terminal unit is connected to a relational database, it can provide many accounting capabilities to non-PC users. In addition, it is advantageous to enter financial transactions information into a PC for several reasons. The PC generally has more processing power and can run accounting application programs, like Quicken or Excel, more quickly and efficiently than a hand-held accounting system. A PC is also more easily connected (and in fact may be permanently connected) to other PCs over a network and can share information and programs among many systems and users. In addition, a PC has more memory and can store more application programs which allows the financial transaction information to be manipulated by different software applications. The additional memory means that the memory does not have to be constantly dumped to accommodate more data, as with portable accounting systems. Thus, PCs are needed if accounting systems are to be used to their full advantage, and the ability to transfer financial transaction data to PCs is an unavoidable part of high-powered accounting systems.
In general, neither PDAs nor financial accounting hardware products allow the user to easily transfer information stored on them to the PC or other terminal unit. In most instances, the user must attach a cable to the hardware product and the PC or other terminal unit, and then enter a series of commands on the product""s keypad. The product then transmits the data. After the data has been transferred, the user must detach the cable from the product and the PC or other terminal unit. Some products can accommodate data transfer between themselves and a PC or another terminal unit using an infrared (IR) adapter to wirelessly link the product to the PC similar to a television remote control unit but the user must enter a series of instructions to transmit the data.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide a portable, hand-held accounting system that wirelessly and automatically transfers information to a remote terminal for processing which avoids the above problems of conventional systems. It is to this end that the present invention is directed.
The invention provides a hand-held device that allows a user to record financial transactions information and make an electronic record of the transaction. Using the invention, the user can electronically store information about a check transaction while writing the check. The invention achieves this result by providing a keypad to enter digital data, such as the check number and the amount, and store it into the device""s memory. The invention also provides a checkwriting surface that supports a check as it is being filled out by the user, that captures the handwritten payee information as it is being written, and that stores the payee information in a bit-map format in the device""s memory. The bit-map may be generated when a pen, having both an ink cartridge and a transmitter, traverses the payee field on the check, which is located above a grid in the device that receives a signal generated by the pen. A bit map is then generated from the portion of the grid traversed by the pen. The bit map may be stored, for example, in a compressed format, such as Tag Image File Format (TIFF), to conserve memory. The grid that captures the payee portion of the check is small, thus minimizing the size and cost of the device.
In another aspect of this invention, the portable hand-held device may automatically grant an accounting software program, such as Quicken, access to the financial transaction information in the device to manipulate the digital data and the image of the handwritten data in the form of X-Y coordinates using accounting software stored in the device. The program is automatically invoked so that the user does not have to scroll through menus or use the keypad to start the program which saves the user time and makes the device more user friendly than other systems.
Because the device captures an image of the handwritten payee information in the form of X-Y coordinates, an alphabetic keypad with its additional 26 keys is not required which makes the device smaller than devices requiring an alphabetic keypad to input data. In addition, the device has an internal clock to record the date and time of the transaction, and a counter to update the next check to be written in the sequence of checks so that the device automatically updates these numbers for each check and the user has less information to input when recording a checking transaction.
In another aspect of the invention, the device may comprise a transceiver, e.g., such as an infrared (IR) transceiver, for wireless communication between the device and a terminal unit, such as a personal computer, an ATM, or a terminal at a merchant""s site. An IR adapter may be plugged into the terminal unit""s serial, parallel, Universal Serial Bus (USB), or IrDA port to receive data from the device. The device can thus, for example, transfer information about a financial transaction to accounting programs running on the PC. Because the IR adapter is part of the device, a separate cable does not have to be attached to and removed from the device. This allows the user to more quickly and easily communicate with the terminal unit.
The device may also allow point-of-sale transactions in which the device can be used to transmit user account data to the point-of-sale terminal to automatically transfer money from the user""s banking account or other financial account to a merchant""s account. The same device can use its IR connection to implement a point-of-sale transaction so that money is automatically debited from a checking or credit account. The user can thus purchase products from merchants without having to exchange paper, and the user and the merchant can both retain a complete digital record of the transaction. Additionally, because checking transactions may be fed into already existing check truncation software, it is possible for the transaction to be transmitted electronically from the user""s account directly to the merchant""s financial system. Thus, check truncation has the potential of dramatically reducing the handling costs of the merchant and the banks associated with a checking transaction.
To transfer money to a merchant""s account, the device may transfer an encrypted signature, the selected account information, and the latest lock step code to a terminal unit at the vendor""s location, which then transfers the information to a checking or credit card processing system. Lock step codes contain encryption keys that are periodically changed so that after a given period, even if the device is lost or stolen, an unauthorized person cannot use the device to access the user""s account. Meanwhile, the merchant transfers to the user transaction information including the date, merchant name, the transaction amount, and a category for the transaction.
The signature encryption and verification at the user""s bank or financial institution, as well as other verification steps, guard against major checking or credit card fraud, especially when the user""s account and the merchant""s account can be accessed through existing systems. At the user""s financial institution, the image of his handwritten signature is compared to an image stored at the financial institution. If the two images and other account information match, and if the user has sufficient funds in his account, the transaction is approved.
Financial transactions using the above method in accordance with the invention have the additional advantage of providing the merchant with accessible digital records. The merchant can thus easily review transactions which are challenged by a user. By contrast, today the transaction information for the user and the merchant are on paper so that whenever the merchant cannot find a receipt, he must pay a transaction charge to a bank. In addition, for the first time, users have accurate financial records so that they can use a computer or a relational database to instantaneously compare their records with financial service providers.